I would support a change to give the board a broader influence on new rules proposals.
Right now pretty much anything can be put out there for one year trial and then voted on,unless the board decides to table it for a period of time,which in my understanding is just a postponement. For me the "leadership" should have a bigger say when it comes to issues with proposals. Afterall, they are the leaders and are charged with doing what is best for the org.and the hobbby.

As for hashing this stuff out on forums I don't beleive it is wise to do this in public forums. You end up getting a lot of trouble makers in there talking about something that most likely will never affect them. If you want a say then pay your
membership dues to our organization. I like the fact that we have a forum here now that is just for IMPBA members,where hopefully contructive conversations can be had.

If I'm elected I will be happy to hear the meberships' concerns about self-righting boats and see if merits any change.

Good stuff guys, I agree.
I know I am as guilty as anyone (worse than some ) about getting tangled up in the rules debates on the forums. However, it is easy to do when you are as passionate about these toy boats as we are.
We should be able to get through just about anything fairly easily with a FE Director in each District, reporting to a active National Director that makes himself available to the membership he is representing.

In District 4 we need a FE Director, this director will not have a Board vote but will get all FE related voting issues from the current District Director and should get these current voting issues from the current National FE Director. This way the District FE director can voice his opinion to both National and District Director on how he/she would like the vote to go.

I myself really know nothing about FE Boats .... except they look really cool. I know there have been voting issues for FE that i myself have no clue what they really are talking about or how it would effect FE as a whole.

I will be trying to run a FE boat this coming 2012 season. I will be getting I hope alot of help from some really good FE members in D4. By racing FE I hope to learn alot more and will hopefully be more help to my District/IMPBA.

Hey Paul,
Thanks for chiming in here. That's really cool your going to run an FE next year.
That is really the best way to learn. Whether I'm elected to the FE director position or not feel free to ask me any question you like about FE, going forward.

I look forward to working with you and the other District Directors in the future.

#1) I would love to see a true Spec or IROC type class created for FE. One hull, motor, prop, no modified allowed. I think allows a couple things in my opinion.

•It will lower the learning curve for those interested in getting their “feet wet” in the FE scene.
•I will minimize the potential of burning up components
•It will help control costs
•Teach newcomers the basics of maintenance and tuning a boat (i.e. set up)
•Puts an emphasis on driving skills
The Evansville club has been very successful doing this with their RTR class and the Miss Vegas. There were some clubs in the past doing this with the SuperVee 27. I am not sure what happen to those classes.

#2) coming from Nitro racing originally, I have struggled to understand how we better control power output for the higher cell count classes. Let’s use 6 cells for instance (Q??). A very popular 6cell set up is a Neu 1527 1Y now take that same voltage and use a Neu 2215 1Y. There is a DRAMATIC difference in the power output between those two motors using the same voltage. Not to mention there is a rough price difference of $175-$200 between those motors. How do we control these constraints to all a more inviting situation to draw new FE boaters or those that want to step up from the P/P-Limited type boats?

In District 4 we need a FE Director, this director will not have a Board vote but will get all FE related voting issues from the current District Director and should get these current voting issues from the current National FE Director. This way the District FE director can voice his opinion to both National and District Director on how he/she would like the vote to go.

I myself really know nothing about FE Boats .... except they look really cool. I know there have been voting issues for FE that i myself have no clue what they really are talking about or how it would effect FE as a whole.

I will be trying to run a FE boat this coming 2012 season. I will be getting I hope alot of help from some really good FE members in D4. By racing FE I hope to learn alot more and will hopefully be more help to my District/IMPBA.

#1) I would love to see a true Spec or IROC type class created for FE. One hull, motor, prop, no modified allowed. I think allows a couple things in my opinion.

•It will lower the learning curve for those interested in getting their “feet wet” in the FE scene.
•I will minimize the potential of burning up components
•It will help control costs
•Teach newcomers the basics of maintenance and tuning a boat (i.e. set up)
•Puts an emphasis on driving skills
The Evansville club has been very successful doing this with their RTR class and the Miss Vegas. There were some clubs in the past doing this with the SuperVee 27. I am not sure what happen to those classes.

#2) coming from Nitro racing originally, I have struggled to understand how we better control power output for the higher cell count classes. Let’s use 6 cells for instance (Q??). A very popular 6cell set up is a Neu 1527 1Y now take that same voltage and use a Neu 2215 1Y. There is a DRAMATIC difference in the power output between those two motors using the same voltage. Not to mention there is a rough price difference of $175-$200 between those motors. How do we control these constraints to all a more inviting situation to draw new FE boaters or those that want to step up from the P/P-Limited type boats?

Thanks for reading,
Mike Ball

Hi Mike,
Well, on #1 I agree with you on the concept of a class like this and all the points you make are valid. However, in my experience these classes do not usually last very long on a local level. I think there are a couple of reasons for this. First it's hard to keep the more experience boaters out of these classes. Most of the time they need to run the class just to have a decent boat count. This can have a negative effect because no matter how much you equalize the equipment there will always be those who are just stellar drivers that will end up winning most of the time. This can be discouraging to the new guys.
The other reason that I have seen is if a guy is really serious about continuing in the hobby it doesn't take long for them to get bored and want something faster.

As for #2 I think the best way to address this is to offer only up to 4s classes or (P)power parameter for your District races. D13 and D12 have done a great job with this and there P-Monos are all rocketships and the racing is always tight. With that said I don't know of anyone runing a 2215 on 6s. These motors are better suited for higher cell counts and once you've got to that point, IMO how much you spend for a motor is not a huge factor considering what everything else cost to set up a high cell count boat.

Perhaps I should start with saying that I’m glad to see that Chris has the same passion as I do for Fast Electrics and is willing to step up to the plate to possibly take over this demanding position.

My involvement with FE began back in 1991 when the entire rule set for FE showed a class structure done by the old Ni Cad cell count and the rest of the rules was nothing more then a half of a page in the rule book. Since then, because of my direction, we now have a comprehensive set of rules in our own section of the rule-book to deal with our diverse needs.

Fast electric is a unique form of racing as it is technology driven causing us to grow with those changes. The most notable change would be the switch from a cell count to a voltage range to create the class structures. This is where I have a bit of an advange coming from an electronics research and design field that thinks up all these new advancements for us to use. It’s true I’m not directly in R&D anymore but I still stay in touch with my colleagues that are working on tomorrow’s stuff today.

Since I’m active in communicating with my electronic geek friends, it leaves little time to respond to individuals on a daily bases and for that I do apologize.

Self-righting boats are nothing new; in fact I have seen them used back in 94. This type of boat is defiantly unique but does show what can be done with a model boat with some inventiveness and intuition. That is one of IMPBA’s mission statements to ‘foster’ model boating. It is very true there might be a problem during heat racing and both the general heat racing rules and additional FE driving rules take address the concerns of self-righting boats that just don’t work as well as they should.

Ah yes, Spec class boats. This is an interesting subject as there are many factors to consider. Generally speaking, spec type boats always work well at a local club level. But then someone comes from another area with similar equipment that performs better due to, what shall we say, “creative rule interpretation”. Now tempers flare, cries of outrange then a national set of rules gets created that ruins the intent of the class. I seen this happen before with a class that was “out of the box” but then after the rule change, which changed the wording to “stock appearing”. That one single change just messed up the whole intent of the class as it now allowed for any type of internal modifications to be made.

So the things to consider for any spec class at the national level are; IMPBA cannot show any favoritism to any one manufacture. To do so is just asking for trouble. The class must be clearly defined as to what is and what is not allowed and how to perform the technical inspection. The technical inspection has to be simple to do. Any thing that involves trying to test battery capacity in the field for say, 50 boats just won’t happen. The CD’s are busy enough and don’t need that kind of added work-load. If a spec class is allowed for records then the need for a simple technical inspection is a must as it would require any special tech equipment to be purchased and maintained by IMPBA.

I fully agree with the reasons of spec class racing and would be more then willing to try and put something together.

I think I covered everything so far but just a few closing comments. To Don F., I knew you guy are running FE over there but you never called me for any direction and lets just leave it at that. To Doug S. if I haven’t answered your question(s) here, feel free to email me.

No matter what the outcome of the election I would be then willing to help Chris in away possible.